Ode to Saki

He is undoubtedly THE funniest author I have ever read!He is like a cross between Oscar Wilde and P.G. Wodehouse. The Clovis series reminds me of Bertie Wooster adventures with absolutely ridiculous things happening while the Reginald series reminds me of Oscar Wilde plays with all its sarcasm and biting social commentary (It's funny how well the old British aristocratic society lent itself to satire and how it was probably also one of the biggest consumers of this satire).

My favourites are the incredibly funny nieces who fooled people with their crazy tales and the scary little nephews who seriously knew how to punish aunts back :O God knows what Saki's aunts had to go through! I'm sure those stories are a little autobiographical :D

Anyway, he is one of the best authors I've read. I'm very grateful to my friends who gifted me his book!

Essay: Middlemarch

I have finished yet another George Eliot book with the feeling of having lived through a lifetime through it. Even though Middlemarch hardly covers a span of 3/4 years, the characters (especially Dorothea) have come a long way by the end of the story. I can't say that I loved it completely because many bits made me very impatient. I could not understand why G.E. goes deep into the nature and history of many very temporary characters! I just didn't feel interested enough in them to read all that. I wish she had given more time to the Fred and Mary romance which I loved best :D :D But she did do them justice in the Finale. I also could not get myself interested in the local politics of that time so I didn't enjoy reading those scenes either. I think many of the things that bored me would have had more significance and meaning for readers of those times. I wonder if the times I'm living in has made me more impatient of too much data that does not have any information in it ;) 

But apart from that, the book did move me a great deal. I was inspired especially by Dorothea's character and with what grace she dealt with the problems she faced, how unselfish she was. I hope I learn to deal with life in a more selfless and courageous way myself. In this book, Eliot has delved deep into the human mind and laid bare many little inconsistencies and anomalies of the human nature that we often would be ashamed to admit even to ourselves. I will cover those in the excerpts which should come up soon! She has again made it very hard to feel in a consistent way for any character by making them as complicated as people in real life are :) I began by disliking Will and even Dorothea but loved them towards the end! This really does set her apart from other writers who have their characters more or less aligned with either the good side or the bad. Even her most useless side-characters often make a surprising show of courage or generosity and stump you. In this book, I was really surprised by how Mrs. Bulstrode dealt with the truth about her husband. The most touching scene in the book was when she gives him her silent support and they sit and cry together :( But I noticed that Eliot, like quite a few other female authors, could not resist exposing the true sly nature of the blonde coquette that male authors love to worship as angels :D I don't blame them...men have an annoying way of blindly attributing every other virtue where they see beauty (even my good ol' Dickens would not have any contradiction between beauty in appearance and in character). By the way, Eliot's pretty, blonde characters are really dangerous! Rosamond and Hetty( from Adam Bede) are two ladies I would stay away from :O Has she seen someone like that in her life?

Another way in which this book brought to light the realities of human nature is by showing how even the closest relationships are not devoid of private motives and judgements. For example, Dorothea and Celia truly love each other but each has her private unfavourable notions about the other. Many of Lydgate's tender gestures towards Rosamond are more a result of personal motives than any real feeling on his part. And it was a little sad when Sir James did not think his baby flawless in appearance. I always thought parents loved their children blindly so this possibility was a little shocking. Next thing you know, even your dog is judging you :O

Anyway, I have Virginia Woolf to thank for her recommendation of this book (I think in one of her own essays). But I must again bring up the point that she made about Austen being awesome enough to not use a pseudonym! Seeing the kind of frankness about human nature that Eliot and the Brontes had in their writing, you really can't blame them! Austen always played it safe...she was sarcastic but didn't really say anything that a 'lady' is not supposed to or have anything really bad happen in her stories (the worst I know is Lydia's elopement with Wickham). These women show that they know more about the vileness of things than is acceptable for a proper lady to know. So really, they can't be compared! 

Middlemarch sure gave me a lott to think about but I will stop this long essay here and hopefully, come up with the excerpts soon.

The Yellow Wallpaper

What a delightful and disturbing read! Especially because I didn't know it was fictional and I thought someone actually went through all that.There is nothing much I want to say about it, except highly recommend it, because I'm unable to explain why I liked it so much. I think it was the crazy imagination and beautiful language (there was something about her language). And somehow, after I came to know that it was one of the earliest feminist works, I liked it much more. Funny because it doesn't explicitly say anything about female suppression or female rebellion: it's just a crazy lady describing in great detail the wallpaper she's obsessed with! But it somehow makes me feel as if something important has been said on behalf of women. Of course, it's purpose was to show how women with mental ailments were neglected in those times so it's not all that random. But it's a very, very subtle feminist work because to me atleast, there didn't seem to be any attempt to convey a message and it was just a crazy story :) One that has to be read!

And Khalid Hosseini does it again!

There is no doubt that he is a master storyteller, just like Saboor in 'And the Mountains Echoed'. In MBA language, story telling is his core competency :D 'And the Mountains Echoed' is yet another beautiful book but also a lot different from the first two because the sorrows faced by the characters are less intense. Unlike the first two, which in a way rely on Afghanistan's unbelievable tragedies to move the reader by their own merit, this book leaves more work to the author because it is more general and less tragic. I think the author is trying to break away from getting into a reptitive theme and context for his books. The narrative by Marcos proves that Hosseini is really a good writer and not just riding on his country's misfortunes to make moving stories. I guess he'll move more towards neutral stories and characters from now.

Rather than a single story, this book is full of multiple small stories from the perspective of different characters. It is so rich in the variety and depth of characters that it is almost like a handbook of the many types of people exisitng in this world. There are people who are strongly shaped by circumstance and people who strongly retain their core inspite of it. He shows how people are so very complicated and makes one wonder if it even makes sense to judge people anymore. I found Parwana and Idris to be two really complex characters. Both of them may have turned out well but they are beaten into being what they are by incidents in their life. Parwana's horrible betrayal of her sister, twice, shows how deeply she must have been affected by the neglect and negative comparison she has faced all her life. And somehow I don't even know if I can blame her for being the way she is: heaven knows how her mind slowly hardened over the years with the constant wounding to her esteem and heart. Idris is such a real character!One of those people whose righteous(or otherwise) anger is expressed through resentment towards all and sundry rather than fruitful action. I guess I'm one of those people too though ;) The relationship between Idris and Timur is so complex. Timur is shown as being a person who is really good at heart despite all his antics and yet he did contribute in making Idris the bitter person he was.

One surprising thing about Hosseini is how sensitive he seems to be to what a plain woman feels and the fact that he brought this situation up in two books. In this book it is Parwana and in 'A Thousand Splendid Suns', it was Mariam. Both are neglected because they are plain and Hosseini describes their reaction to it with a surprising amount of insight. I thought you would have to be in the shoes of such a person, or atleast a girl, to understand it but Hosseini does a great job. For instance, when he points out in the book that Parwana was not angry that the boys threw pebbles but that they threw them only on Masooma! But I wonder what his connection to it is. Or as usual, I'm reading too much into things :D

My favourite excerpt in the book: "Pari spots an old woman across the street, wearing  a plastic rain bonnet, labouring up the sidewalk trailed by a small tan terrier. Not for the first time, a little puff breaks rank from the collective fog of Pari's memories and slowly takes the shape of a dog. Not a little toy like the old woman's, but a big mean specimen, furry, dirty, with a severed tail and ears. Pari is unsure whether this, in fact, is a memory or the ghost of one or neither. She had asked Maman once if they had ever owned a dog in Kabul and Maman said, You know I don't like dogs. They have no self-respect. You kick them and they still love you. It's depressing."

When I kindly overlook Maman's idiotic opinion, this para gives me goosebumps for some reason. The contrast between the two dogs is much like the contrast between Paris and Kabul and the two very different lives of Pari. It's beautifully put. And I love the fact that it's a dog that still binds Pari to her remote past. Dogs are like that :)

Memorable Book Beginnings

The first line of a book can be quite important because it often sets the tone for the rest of the book and writers have often used it to great effect. Here are a list of beginnings that are memorable. Some of them are obvious choices, some very witty and ironical, and some have this ring of significance that can be felt but cannot be explained(as with many of the best things in the world!)

Call me Ishmael.

-Moby Dick

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way--in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only.

- A Tale of Two Cities

Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show. To begin my life with the beginning of my life, I record that I was born (as I have been informed and believe) on a Friday, at twelve o'clock at night. It was remarked that the clock began to strike, and I began to cry, simultaneously.

-David Copperfield

Scarlett O'Hara was not beautiful, but men seldom realized it when caught by her charm as the Tarleton twins were.

-Gone with the Wind

It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife. 

-Pride and Prejudice

Mr. and Mrs. Dursley, of number four, Privet Drive, were proud to say that they were perfectly normal, thank you very much.

-Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone

This is just a few books and I'll keep adding more as and when I get them.

Essay:Feminism in literature

Do male authors ever write about average women?Female characters are almost unfailingly beautiful in books authored by men :D Infact, they are generally a perfect package of great looks, high intelligence and supreme confidence. I think male authors have a very black-and-white perception of women. To them, women are either angels from heaven or villains sent to break their hearts. Take Vanity Fair for example: Amelia and Becky Sharp are two extremes of womankind. One is too soft and innocent to defend even herself and the other, too manipulating and scheming. If there is one grouse I have with Dickens, it is his portrayal of women. Of course, it is a recent development!His heroines(Agnes Wickfield particularly) were my models of humanity. They were perfect in every way:kind, patient and loving. There was never a fault with them and they were incapable of hurting anyone. Indeed, they often put others before themselves. Now, I ask myself why!Why should women have to be angels who guide the hero of the novel to the path of righteousness?Women are as human as men and as liable to have their own weaknesses. We are all learning from life and though women's maternal instincts make them naturally kinder, they cannot, and need not, be flawless!

Female authors have often tried to battle this perception. They rarely write about perfect women. You either have Scarlett O'Hara's looks or Melanie Hamilton's character, rarely both. Their heroines are not demi-gods but real people like Elizabeth Bennet, Jane Eyre or Jo. I almost feel as if female authors are pleading with the world, through their characters, to see that women are a mixture of good and bad, virtues and vices. Their women are more complex and vulnerable and want to be accepted the way they are. And they don't always have to be good!

Let alone the characters, the authors themselves have had to encounter prejudice of this kind in the reception of their books. Female authors often used pseudonyms to hide their gender because they didn't want people's opinions of their work to be distorted by it. Jane Austen was one of the few who didn't and Virginia Woolf praises her for it. But the Bronte sisters weren't as lucky. People thought their books were vulgar because they were too open about feelings and passions than women had any right to be. Wuthering Heights was criticized as being coarse and Jane Eyre, too passionate. The world has surely come a long way since then. Female authors are not ostracized for being frank anymore but do women still have to shoulder the responsibility for perfect morality?I don't know..I'm still stuck in the 19th century.

Essay:The Mill on the Floss

I had wanted for sometime to read a book by George Eliot for two reasons: she was liked by Charlotte Bronte and she was one of the Big Four(the others being Charlotte Bronte, Emily Bronte and Jane Austen) mentioned in a Room of One's Own by Virginia Woolf(I'm not a big fan but still, the lady had some good judgement ;)). I randomly picked up The Mill on the Floss and am very happy that I did.

The book has moved me a great deal. It is one of those "epics" where you feel as if you have actually spent a lifetime through it rather than just a period of someone's life. I felt the same about Gone with the Wind: you go through various and strong emotions along with the characters in their intense joy and suffering and are left in awe by the end of the book. To my knowledge, this book has been very different from it's contemporaries in the way it has handled it's characters and most of all, in the way it ended. I really did not expect Tom and Maggie's life to be cut short like that but for me, it was a happy ending! I don't think it could have ended more beautifully. You might think I have a morose mind and the person who wrote the introduction to the story felt that G.E. could surely have conjured up a happier ending. However, to me, the central point was the love that existed between the brother and sister that was sorely obstructed by misfortune and their vastly different natures so I was just happy they loved each other again like they did as little children;nothing and noone could come again to spoil it! I just felt happy that Maggie was satisfied in her one great wish to be simply loved by Tom without judgement. It seems human nature rejoices as much in touching tragedy as in happy endings and authors have totally exploited that  :D Shakespeare's tragedies are more loved and admired than his comedies, aren't they?

This book initially put me in a lot of confusion. I was always used to utterly and completely siding with the protagonist of any book I read and I assumed that since, Maggie is the protagonist of this book, all my sympathy will be directed towards her. Yet, I often found myself supporting Tom over Maggie and couldn't help wondering if I had lost feelings like compassion and generosity. Of late, I have been suspecting myself of losing some of my idealistic notions and turning a little practical/cynical(honestly, the world seems too grey and complicated to have fixed ideas and opinions anymore!Live and let live seems to be the best policy to follow :)). This unusual reaction caused me to worry a little. Then I realised that's exactly what the book wants me to do. It doesn't want me to point out that this person is a hero and that person is a villain. Rather, it is showing me that everyone in the book, without exception, has both merits and demerits. Maggie is no angel, Tom is no villain, Philip is no long-suffering saint and Stephen is not a heartless traitor. They have all, including the dull Mrs Tulliver, done both good and bad things. Even the grouchy Aunt Glegg is redeemed in the end!I think George Eliot wants to convey that human nature is too complicated and mixed to be judged too severely and so, we must just help each other along the way rather than being bent on punishing everyone for their faults.

By some weird coincidence, many of the books I read have themes that are similar to my life at that point because of which I can relate better to them! Here, Tom and Maggie's passage into care-ridden adulthood coincided with what I've come to finally accept, that I must grow up :D But it brought back to me why childhood is so amazing. For one, we had time to stand and stare, as that poet says. I miss the balcony at 27/5 from where I had an awesome view of the vast sky that I would stare at joblessly. Nowadays, the sky has become a rare sight in Mumbai >:( Secondly, we had unalloyed fun. Fun was not analysed to find out if it was good enough or cool enough; it was just had. Thirdly, we had unalloyed affection. We just liked people till we had a reason not to. We were barely aware of their faults, let alone their virtues. But these are luxuries only a protected, dependent individual may enjoy without getting into a lot of trouble :D The Mill on the Floss was an amazing read and I'm looking forward to more of George Eliot in the future!

CORRECTION: The author Charlotte Bronte mentions is George Sand, not George Eliot.I conveniently mixed up the last names!